On April 9th this year, children and adults from all over the world will be attempting to break the world record for the Largest Simultaneous Lesson. This event is taking part in over 50 countries and is part of the campaign to get every child in the world into school by 2015. The Global Campaign for Education (GCE) is a worldwide coalition of NGOs and teachers' unions, operating in more than 150 countries, united in their determination to make the right to education a reality. They believe that: The single most important lesson of the past century is that education wipes out poverty and nourishes democracy. Educating girls and women is especially crucial: it leads directly to better family health, economic growth, and lower rates of child mortality and malnutrition. The single biggest mistake of our time has been to deny women and girls the right to read and write - the means to build a better life. As we start the 21st century, 70 million girls are still out of school and 550 million women - nearly one in every five - are illiterate. How much longer will we allow this to go on? At the 2000 UN Millennium Summit, world leaders agreed to get as many girls as boys into school by 2005. Yet, with only two years to go, they are well short of their target. Without emergency action, they will fail outright. The GCE's third Global Week of Action from April 6-13 2003 is calling for immediate steps to open the doors of learning for women and girls. They need your support. If enough of us demand it, governments will be forced to take positive action to get girls into school. For more information, contact: GCE World Record, c/o Education International 5 bd. du Roi Albert II, Brussels, B-1210 Belgium Tel: 00 32 2 224 0627; Fax: 00 32 2 224 0606; Email: worldrecordregistration@campaignforeducation.org Website: http://www.campaignforeducation.org/_html/2003-docs/02-gaw-wrinstr/frameset.shtml